


Provenance

by fourfreedoms



Category: Anno Dracula Series - Kim Newman, Carmilla - J. Sheridan Le Fanu, Hockey RPF
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Vampires, Blow Jobs, First Time, M/M, Rookies, Shower Sex, Suit Porn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-13
Updated: 2015-04-13
Packaged: 2018-03-22 16:45:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3736252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fourfreedoms/pseuds/fourfreedoms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“I uh, didn’t think it would be done so fast,” Patrick said when he arrived.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Jonathan stared at him. “Done? You insult me. A good suit, at a lackluster slapdash minimum, needs three-fittings. You’ll be in here for four, I assure you.”</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Provenance

**Author's Note:**

> This story was known on tumblr for the longest time as the vampire tailor. Somehow, I finally got my shit together and finished it. Thanks go to demotu and to joyfulseeker for reading over it and brainstorming. Also to svmadelyn, who sent me an email chock full of ideas when I was stuck and floundering. 
> 
> All of you should be proud of me for the many mentions of blood in this story, severe haemophobe that I am. 
> 
> This story owes much to Kim Newman's conception of vampires in his Anno Dracula universe, as well as Richard Anderson's autobiography, _Savile Row: Ripped and Smoothed_ , a hilarious recounting on the adventures of apprenticing on Savile Row.

J. B. Toews & Co. opened its doors in 1898 on Robey Street with a simple gilded sign claiming ‘tailoring of quality.' It was one of the first vampire owned businesses in Chicago, and Jonathan Toews, the shop’s owner, opened it up because he was bored. He assumed after a couple of decades, he’d move on, start a new pursuit. He didn’t.

The shop closed briefly during World War I, after Canada declared war on Germany. There was the sticky matter of the V-draft, and despite his ex-patriot status, Great Britain was snapping up as many vampires as possible to combat the Luftwaffe and Jadgeschwader 1. When it was all over, Jonathan had served in both the RFC and the RAF, gotten 51 victories, and been shot down three times. He’d already been alive for nearly a hundred years by then, so the VC they awarded him seemed fairly superfluous. Either way, he was perfectly happy to return to his little Wicker Park shop and do nothing more exciting than measure inseams and shove pins through wool twill.

The shop labored on over the years, gradually gaining both notoriety and fame. The fame came from the garments (‘as good as anything found on Savile Row’), but the notoriety came from Jonathan’s own prickliness. He was good at assessing figures and anticipating trends, something that belied his humble origins. The explanations for this sartorial savantism were many. It was rumored he’d been given the kiss by the notable vampires La Fontaine, Madame de Rambouillet, Orlando, or even the dissipated dandies of England that Jonathan predated by a good fifty years. He never bothered to clarify. His history was his business. 

By the early 2000s, Jonathan was starting to get heartily bored again. He was on his second century and had been cutting suits for nearly half of that. Work in the shop was getting stale.

But then one dreary fall morning the little bell over his door rang, and hard on the heels of a group of larger, slightly older gentleman, in walked a quiet, bed-headed young man who set his day topsy-turvy.

Standing on the gallery on the second story looking down upon the store, he watched while his apprentices rushed to help the customers. He recognized some of them. Athletes of difficult proportions often found themselves in his establishment. Jonathan had already made a blue wool single button double-vent game day suit for Patrick Sharp, and another in flannel, sleek and high-armholed, for James Wisniewski. The crowd of Blackhawks milling about was a little unusual, but it rapidly became clear that Sharp had dragged them all in for fittings.

Jonathan sighed. He had plenty of custom already and only so many people he trusted as assistants. Vampire or no, he still had to sleep.

He walked down the stairs thoroughly unamused. Sharp greeted him enthusiastically and Jonathan spared a nod for him. Cuts flashed through his mind as he looked at each player in turn. Seabrook, double-button, reversed side-vents, worsted, super 180, in a dark solid. Havlat, triple button, slanting side pockets, herringbone, navy. The young man, on the other hand, gave him pause.

Jonathan could tell from the way he wandered around, staring at everything and darting furtive glances at him that the kid hadn’t spent overmuch time in the company of vampires. He was horribly attired of course, hair an absolute mess. But when he chewed on his lower lip and joked with his teammates, something about him seemed to light up, grey-blue eyes lasering in on whoever was talking to him. Something to bring out those eyes? Grey with blue windowpane check, perhaps. Maybe dove grey birdseye. When he assembled it in his head, he liked the look of neither. This was more complicated than he initially thought.

"Kaner, I know we’re not here for you, but you need to do something about that funeral sack you always wear," Sharp said, slumped back on one of the leather couches, watching Seabrook fidget while his assistant Molly measured his inseam.

The kid, Kaner, he supposed, looked up. “Nobody’s ever complained about what I wear,” he said with a shrug.

Jonathan gave him a quick once-over. He highly doubted that.

Patrick Sharp chimed in right on cue. “This is me complaining.” 

Kaner didn’t stand for a fitting that day, but he ended up coming back by himself a month later, nearly into the Christmas season. The bell rang again, cold air rushing in. 

“Did somebody complain?” Jonathan said dryly as he made his way down the stairs to greet Kaner.

“Huh?” Kaner said.

Jonathan raised a brow at him. “About what you wear?”

“Oh, oh!” Kaner said, blushing bright red. “Well, I mean, about my ties actually? And then I guess I just thought, maybe you’d know what to do.”

Jonathan snorted. He was quite certain Kaner would buy a suit by Ed Hardy if Ed Hardy had the audacity to put one together.

Molly rushed in from the back, measuring tape around her neck, looking frazzled. They were behind, too many orders this year. Bespoke was regaining some of its lost popularity over made-to-measure. People were asking him to travel, as if he were Richard Anderson or Strickland. Perhaps if he still enjoyed it, he would. But truly, Jonathan figured, better to make them come to him. 

“I’m so sorry, Jon,” she said, “I didn’t even hear the bell.”

Jonathan waved her off. “It’s all right. I’ll take this one.”

She paused, surprised. It had been a long time since he’d taken an interest in a client that wasn’t high-profile. Pro-athlete or not, this kid was still playing for a failed franchise in a city that couldn’t be bothered to care about hockey. She nodded at him slowly and he delicately pulled the tape measure from around her shoulders.

He turned back to the kid. “If I do this, it’s not just going to be a tie.”

“Uh, well, I don’t—” he cut himself off when Jonathan ignored him and started measuring, rapidly running the tape measure along his shoulders, his sleeve, and the length of his back. “Don’t you need to write that down?”

“Arms,” Jonathan said and Kaner hurried to lift them. Jonathan looped the tape around his chest. “Breathe,” he reminded and Kaner let out a breath.

Jonathan then wound the tape around his waist. “I don’t need to write it down.”

Kaner coughed. “Right, vampire.”

“Or, just good at my job,” he replied and bent to take Kaner’s inseam.

Jonathan ran the tape up his leg swiftly, but Kaner still jerked slightly when his fingertips reached his inner thigh.

“To the right or to the left?” he asked. The jeans the kid was wearing were so baggy it was impossible to determine.

“Wh-what?” Kaner stuttered.

Jonathan held in a smile and looked up at him, still holding the tape along the inseam of his jeans. He raised his brows meaningfully.

Kaner blushed prettily. “To the left,” he said softly, unable to meet Jonathan’s eyes.

Something about his expression and the high color of his cheeks made Jonathan’s fangs drop down. He cleared his throat and stood up rapidly, forcibly willing his fangs to retract. That hadn’t happened in over a centennial. Embarrassed, he took the rest of the measurements as clinically as possible.

When he was finished, he tossed the tape aside and stepped away, measurements firmly cemented in his memory. “Come back in two weeks. It would be sooner, but, we’re a little busy at the moment.” 

Kaner looked like a deer in the headlights, abashed and uncertain. “Uh,” he started to say, but then stopped and shook his head, turning for the door.

“And Kaner?” Jonathan called after him. “Try the grey silk stripe.” He nodded at the display of ties next to the window.

“Um, how much?” Kaner asked, looking at the tie like it was a nuclear bomb about to go off.

“It’s a gift,” Jonathan replied brusquely.

“Oh, uh, well…thank you?” Kaner said, thoroughly red again as he gingerly picked the looped tie up from the table. Jonathan turned away, already patterning the cut in his mind. At the door, Kaner stopped and said, “It’s Patrick.”

Jonathan looked over at him. “What?”

“My name. Patrick Kane,” he said, “Kaner is uh…my nickname. In hockey.”

Jonathan laughed. “Good to know.” 

*

Jonathan employed three cutters at his shop besides Molly, as well as an apprentice, and two shop assistants. None of them were vampires. It would be easier he supposed, to not have to reteach and retrain everybody on his methods about as fast as trends changed. But Jonathan only kept the company of a select few vampires in Chicago when he could help it, Larry Darrell, who flew with him out of Andover during the Great War, Lil Hardin, and a few others who’d found their way here over the years. 

Younger vampires irritated him. While nothing could be so bad as the 80s, the current trend to ‘embrace vampire roots’ and the pop psychology nonsense about no longer being adapted for their environment, reminded him over and over how the mess in Europe started to begin with. Jonathan had never given another soul the kiss. The whole affair seemed like entirely too much effort.

He liked working with humans. Their short lives kept their creativity fresh. They didn’t seem to run out of steam the way Jonathan was quite certain he had. Or, at least he’d thought so until this project for Kane.

He debated for a whole hour over fabric, settling at last on a dark navy wool-mohair with a shadow stripe. It would be a winter suit, which meant he’d need to make another one for the spring. He started cycling through swatches, almost by rote. A black herringbone maybe? Or a solid in linen? Not linen, it creased too easily, and he shuddered to think of the kid getting the thing dry-cleaned.

It would be easier if he was done growing. Jonathan had so rarely made anything for children or teenagers. His rates were too high to waste on juveniles. He doubted that Kane would spring up several inches in the near future, but he thought, even with seam allowance, he’d have to worry about those shoulders. The slim cut with a 3-button and narrow lapels he arrived at after several sketches would hopefully add some length to Kane’s frame. He played with leaving it unvented, but quickly discarded it as a bit too trendy for somebody like Patrick Kane who hadn’t yet figured out how to operate a hair brush.

For the trousers he went with a flat-front and double besom pockets. The less noise, the better, he figured. The leg-break gave him some trouble, though. Slight, full, or medium? He was unsure there. Good god, he’d probably have to get the kid appropriate shoes on top of everything else.

“Who is this one for?” Molly asked after his fifth consecutive late night. “Not the Kane kid?”

“Molly, he’s a disaster. We’re probably going to have to tailor him some shirts on top of everything else,” Jonathan said, looking up from his work on the basted suit. Everything in his shop was hand sewn, but it’d been an age since he bothered to do this slow work himself. He considered visible stitching on the exteriors, but unless they also got him some serious barbering, a clean look was probably for the best.

“Goodness, I can see you plotting,” she told him.

“Plotting? Hardly,” Jonathan replied. “They brought him into my shop because he needed fixing. So I’m fixing him.”

Molly snorted and left to go home to her family.

*

He had one of the assistants call to get Kane back into the shop for the second fitting.

“I uh, didn’t think it would be done so fast,” he said when he arrived.

Jonathan stared at him. “Done? You insult me. A good suit, at a lackluster slapdash minimum, needs three-fittings. You’ll be in here for four, I assure you.”

“I will, will I?” Kane said, smiling at him.

Jonathan glared back.

They had to lend him a shirt for the fitting—a ready-made Huntsman which was serviceable enough. Jonathan didn’t do ready-to-wear and he never would. People needed to stop pestering him about it. On the podium with Patrick Kane before him in his half-finished suit, he wondered who the hell thought this was a good idea?

“It looks like it fits to me,” Patrick said, tugging at the cuffs. An assistant knelt at his feet, subtly adjusting details while Jonathan looked him over with a critical eye. They looked like glaringly obvious errors to Jonathan, but that was what the other fittings were for. Because by god ‘it looks like it fits’ was about the worst thing a person could say about one of his cuts.

Patrick fidgeted miserably. They kept it cool in the shop, to suit Jonathan’s own body chemistry, and the suit wasn’t even lined yet, so he knew it wasn’t from heat.

“Desist,” he said, placing a palm in the small of Kane’s back.

Kane straightened up under his hand and stopped jouncing his leg like he had to avail himself of the toilet.

“Joseph, will you please get Mr. Kane a glass of water?” he asked his assistant.

Jonathan took Joseph’s place, subtly checking seams and break. There was more bulk to the kid’s thighs than he’d initially anticipated. This irritated him. Hockey player, after all. He should have known better.

He got to his feet and stepped in close to pin the waistline a little tighter around Kane’s narrow hips, arms going around him. Kane sucked in a breath and Jonathan looked up to meet his eyes. Kane had gone bright red across the bridge of his nose. Jonathan didn’t move his hands.

“You have to breathe,” Jonathan reminded him, softly, “or it won’t fit.”

He was level with Kane’s chest, and he was seized suddenly with an insane thought. It would be very easy indeed to lean up and kiss him. To puncture that delicate throat with his fangs. The way the kid stared at him, embarrassed and open-faced, he would probably let him.

“Here’s your water,” Joseph said, coming back with a bottle of Smart Water.

Jonathan dropped his hands from Patrick’s waist and stepped back.

He cleared his throat. “Three weeks,” he said, brusquely. “For your next fitting. Joseph will finish up with you.”

He left the showroom, making sure to keep his pace as measured as possible.

There were definitely better places for him to be. Places where infant hockey players didn’t look at him like…well, like that.

*

Two weeks later, he had Molly call the kid back into the shop. It took some doing, because surprise of all surprises, Patrick Kane hadn’t been sent down to the minors yet. He was actually getting ice time. The local media had started spinning a narrative about the young breakout star of the Blackhawks, and that meant his schedule was a little booked.

Jonathan had to stave off a wave of annoyance the second time Kane rescheduled. He didn’t even know why it bothered him.

Well, that wasn’t true. He knew and he hated himself a little bit for it. Jonathan hadn’t had sex with a human since 1942, and he hadn’t bitten one since blood-banking moved to a volunteer donor system in 1970. That this child was making him question himself, causing his fangs to drop like a raw fledgling, just made it that much worse. It certainly wasn’t appropriate.

Even still, he found himself making space on his calendar to fit the boy in on a Monday when the shop wasn’t even open.

Kane came by fifteen minutes early, looking as nervous and flustered as ever, Jonathan could hear his heartbeat. He sighed. It would be so much easier if Kane weren’t so blatantly fascinated with him. But the kid had been around maybe two elders in his entire life and not many fledglings. Anything he felt could be easily attributed to awe. Jonathan knew his effect on people. He’d spent a long time using it to his advantage. But he wouldn’t be able to live with himself if he used that now.

It became immediately apparent that agreeing to meet after hours was a horrible miscalculation when Kane went into the dressing room to get changed and Jonathan realized there was absolutely nobody else there. There wouldn’t be any easy retreat this time. That was idiotic. Next time he’d have to insist on working hours. Kane took forever in the dressing room though and Jonathan allowed that irritation to supersede his entirely inappropriate interest in the child. 

When he finally did step out, Jonathan saw him only as a tailor saw a client. A second cloth fitting after going straight to the forward (Jonathan hadn’t bothered with a skeleton basting since 1925) might have seemed like overkill, but ultimately Jonathan was glad of it. Kane had packed on muscle in the short time since Jonathan saw him last. He was going to have to take out the shoulders and the chest, widen the arms, and nip the waist in a little to balance it.

Kane’s cheeks went scarlet when Jonathan commented on it. “Just training, you know,” he said with a shrug that painfully revealed the way the suit needed to be let out a few centimeters in the shoulders.

Jonathan had to fight against the desire to smile.

"I like it," Kane said, meeting Jonathan’s eyes in the mirror as Jonathan adjusts the hemline on one of his cuffs. His voice hitched when Jonathan smoothed the fabric at his shoulders.

"Do you shoot left?" he asked.

"Yeah." Patrick blinked at him, clearly surprised that Jonathan could talk hockey at all. "How’d you guess?"

"Your shoulders are slightly uneven," Jonathan replied. "More muscle and bulk on one side. We’ll compensate for that of course."

"Oh." Patrick squinted into the mirror. "It’s not like, super noticeable is it?"

Jonathan did smile this time. “Probably only to somebody like me.”

"I wore the tie you gave me, a few games back," Patrick said, clearing his throat. "My mom actually called to compliment me after she saw me on TV."

"I saw," Jonathan replied. He hadn’t meant to, but he’d been curious, and so the other night he’d put the game on and actually wound up watching the whole way through. Kane was something else. Of course, the tie coupled with his off-the-rack, Sunday-best, insult to the garment industry two-piece trash had made everything else look like that much more of a disaster. "We’re going to have to get you some proper shirts."

Patrick pushed a hand through his unruly curls. Jonathan watched the motion of it, there was potential in that raggedy mop.”I feel like I’m getting a makeover,” he said.

Jonathan snorted. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

Patrick burst out laughing. “You’re an asshole.”

He looked a little shocked at himself for coming right out with it. Jonathan ignored it.

"Stay still." Jonathan poked him in the side. Patrick settled down.

"Do you make all the stuff you wear yourself?" he asked and gestured at Jonathan’s own suit.

"Mmhm," Jonathan replied. It was a good one, a steel grey three-piece he built last year that he liked to pair with a pale blue poplin shirt and a navy tie. The jacket had been delicately laid across one of the leather couches at the front of the showroom, and he’d rolled his sleeves up. The most casual he ever allowed anybody to see him.

"So like, what do you do besides make suits?" Patrick asked as Jonathan stepped away from the podium to look at his planned alterations. It would fall nicely when he was done.

"Hmm?"

"What are you into?" Patrick asked again.

What is he ‘into?’ Good lord, this reminded him yet again of just how young Patrick really was. What did Jonathan do besides make suits? What a question. Read books, have sex, and eat. That pretty much rounded it out. No wonder he’d been stagnating so badly. He cleared his throat. “I play a lot of golf.”

"You’re a vampire who plays golf?" Patrick said.

"Why not?" Jonathan asked.

Patrick stared at him, blank-faced.

Jonathan gestured at him to get off the podium. “Go get changed. You’re done for now.”

"How much longer?" he asked on his way to the dressing room. All that remained were the minor adjustments, the handfelling, and then finishing off the buttons and pockets. It wasn’t much labor at all, especially not with the way he’d been devoting time to this one. He toyed with saying another two weeks, just to be a contrary asshole.

"By Wednesday," was what came out of his mouth instead. He really had entirely lost his mind.

"Oh, wow, Sharpy said this would take two months," Patrick said on the other side of the curtains.

He’d been caught. Goddamn it. He sighed gustily. “I’ve been paying more attention to yours than I should.”

"Why’s that?" Patrick asked, pushing the curtain aside. He was shirtless, and Jonathan's eyes followed the pale lines of his throat leading to the delicate hollow between his collarbones, his lip-pink nipples. It was enough to make him crazy.

"You needed the help," he said, inordinately brusque, turning away and pretending to busy himself with tidying up the shop displays.

"Asshole," Patrick repeated.

Jonathan raised a single brow.

"I like you anyway," Patrick said, tugging on his shirt followed by a thick sweater.

"How fortunate," Jonathan replied dryly. He scooped up the heavy North Face coat Patrick had abandoned on one of the couches when he came in. Jonathan wasn’t sensitive to the cold, so the appeal of a shapeless, plasticine bag was entirely lost on him.

Patrick struggled into the bulky thing and pulled on some heavy mittens (mittens? he really had his work cut out for him). Jonathan courteously waited until he was fully covered before he opened the door to kick him out into the cold. “Wednesday,” he said simply and Patrick nodded.

"See you then, I guess."

" ‘I guess,’ " Jonathan mocked and gestured him out.

He stood still and silent in the shop for a long time running over and over it. Reading, fucking, and eating, he thought to himself. Well, he was obviously not doing enough of the middle one. That would have to be rectified.

*

The US didn’t have many elders. There was that saying—in Europe they thought 100 miles was a long way to drive, in America, they thought 100 years was a long time. It was as true of vampires who found themselves in the States as it was of buildings or cities. Jonathan had traveled, most of it in the dawn of his kiss, but he always found himself back on the continent of his birth. His citizenship remained Canadian, despite this last century in Illinois. There was war throughout the 20th century to remind him if ever he chose to forget.

The lifeblood of his progenitors still ran in human veins on the flat plains and prairies of Manitoba. His father had been a merchant with the North West Company, and his mother was the daughter of a long line of voyageurs. They’d settled in the Red River Colony in 1815 with Jonathan born just after the Battle of Seven Oaks. There he’d lived with his family for all of his human years. He couldn’t call himself anything other than Canadian, even though he was older than any modern conception of Canada. Of course, his family were all long dead. His younger brother was one of the first bodies interred at Brookside cemetery in Winnipeg. He had never gone back to visit. Too painful.

He wasn’t, by any means, the oldest to find himself in North America. Madeleine de Verchères was still alive, and Nancy Hart, and obviously Poe still maundered about. But he was at the upward end, especially for male vampires, who seemed to be much better at getting themselves dead than their feminine counterparts. Less control, he supposed. When excess and lechery took too large a bite out of the local human population, humans had understandable desire to retaliate.

All that this meant though was that sometimes, even in discourse with other vampires, Jonathan felt his age. He felt it especially tonight at a vampire soiree, even as he sat on a low couch, with a good glass of RH- blood in his hand, getting an admirable suckjob from a vampire girl of at least 50.

There were carnal acts happening all over the fashionable Gold Coast penthouse. Right in the middle of conversations, even, as was standard for these types of get togethers. There was a discussion of politics happening that he was ostensibly participating in, but it exasperated him, and he kept getting distracted from the wet pull on his cock by some inane comment about the industrial prison complex, or the subprime mortgage crisis, or the Pleistocene diet vampires had started bandying about, and mostly about how laughable humans were.

He made an annoyed sound and pushed the girl off of him, before swallowing off the last of his glass and doing up his fly.

“Where are you going?” the girl asked when he got to his feet.

“Elsewhere,” he said simply.

Elsewhere turned out to be the shop. He got back to the workroom, spotted Kane’s suit on the dress form, and finished by Wednesday turned into finished by Tuesday morning.

So, fucking didn’t really work out as planned.

*

The fit was perfect when Patrick came in for the fin bar fin. All that was missing was the buttons and the felling on the interior.

“Uhhhh,” Patrick said, when he saw himself in the triptych mirror.

“You bowl me over with your praise,” Jonathan said, voice flat, as he glanced over the suit. Patrick had the same Huntsman on underneath, but Jonathan had already begun a number of shirts for him to rotate out on game days. He was carefully not thinking about how obsessed with this project he’d become. The look wasn’t complete though, and he gestured at Joseph to get some ties from one of the displays. 

Joseph came back with three in silk and Jonathan selected a soft mauve that he knew he would never convince Patrick to wear out of the shop, that nevertheless went nicely with his peaches and cream complexion.

“I can do it myself,” he protested weakly when Jonathan stepped up to the podium, straightened up his collar and looped the tie in a full-windsor. Patrick’s pulse jumped as Jonathan slid the knot up to the base of his throat.

Jonathan moved away, backing up to view his handiwork.

Clapping came from the back of the shop. “You did a lovely job,” Molly said, pushing her glasses down her nose and smiling up at Patrick. “You look very cool, darling,” she told him in an affected British accent. 

He grinned, easy with the compliment. “Thanks.”

Jonathan rolled his eyes. “Get dressed.”

When Patrick came back out in a hoodie, jeans, and worn sneakers a few moments later Jonathan did his best not to shudder. “You can pick it up by the end of the week,” he said and reached out to pull the drawstring on one side of Patrick’s hoodie so at least it would hang symmetrically.

“Cool,” Patrick replied, shifting from foot to foot.

“Two things.” Jonathan ran his eyes over him. “Shoes and a barber.”

“Huh?”

“I can do nothing for you about the shoes,” Jonathan answered. “When you come back to pick up the suit, Joseph will give you a list of places. I suggest some basic cap-toes. As for the barber, put your coat on.”

He spun on his heel and started heading for the front of the shop.

Patrick scrambled to get his jacket on, jogging after him. “Wait, wait, what’s going on?” he asked, nearly tripping in his haste out the door.

Jonathan looked over at him. He reached out and fingered a curl falling over Patrick’s forehead. He shouldn’t have, but he couldn’t quite help himself. “You, my dear, seem quite determined to make yourself look stupid.”

Patrick opened his mouth, getting ready for a hot retort, no doubt. Jonathan cut him off. “Why is that?” he asked.

Patrick’s face flamed up. He dropped his eyes, but he continued walking with Jonathan down the block.

“Got called pretty a lot, did you?” Jonathan asked, amused.

“Oh, shut up,” Patrick replied.

Jonathan laughed and stopped in front of the barbershop. He held the door open and gestured Patrick through. It was a ridiculous hipster place, this shop, but Henry had been trimming Jonathan’s hair for the last two years, ever since the place opened, and he was more than adequate. Certainly better than some downtown locations he could think of.

It was quiet at this time of day, but Henry was thankfully available. He came out, dressed in jeans and plaid with heavy brown boots. Jonathan regretted that he’d grown his beard out. The mountain man look didn’t do much to recommend him, but his hair was neat as a pin with a severe part down the side. Typical hipster, though he found it unlikely that Patrick had much experience with those sorts of people. 

Henry easily agreed to cut Patrick’s hair, probably because he could tell what a disaster it was, and Jonathan settled himself on a sofa along the back wall to a wait.

“Get you a bourbon?” Henry asked Patrick as he sat down in Henry’s chair.

“I don’t think so,” Jonathan said before Kane could answer. “He’s 19.”

Patrick glared at him in the mirror and Jonathan smiled back.

Henry chuckled. “Busted. So what are we doing today?”

Patrick let out a breath. “Ask him.” He jerked his head back at Jonathan. 

Henry glanced over at him, thoroughly amused, and Jonathan cleared his throat. “About a finger’s width on the sides I should think, a little longer on the top. Just—” he gestured with a hand, “neaten him up.”

Patrick snorted and slumped a little in the chair, but he didn’t fight it when Henry laid the cape over his shoulders and got to work. It only took about fifteen minutes, Patrick glared at him in the mirror the entire time. It took everything Jonathan had to not to burst out laughing. 

Simple though it may be, the effect when Henry finished was profound. “You look good, kid,” Henry said.

Patrick sighed. It was much harder to hide his fine high cheek bones, lush mouth, and bright, thickly fringed eyelashes without that raggedy mop to distract the eye. “Thanks,” he said, ever polite.

“How much?” Patrick asked, reaching into his back pocket for his wallet after Henry’s pulled the cape off and started sweeping up the floor. 

Henry stopped and looked over at Jonathan. Jonathan shook his head.

“Don’t worry about it,” Henry said. “Come back in four weeks.”

Patrick sighed again, deeper this time. When he followed Jonathan back out onto the street he said, “I kind of hate you, you know that?”

Jonathan looked over at him. “Yeah, you get back to me in a week after you’ve gotten laid about twelve times.”

“I do alright,” Patrick replied heatedly as they came to a stop in front of the stairs leading up to the L.

Jonathan stepped in close, forcing Patrick to look up at him. He leaned forward, watching Kane’s pupils expand and his pretty pink lips part. “I don’t doubt that, dollface,” he said soft, low, the same voice he’d use to seduce the kid into bed.

The thought struck him and he immediately stepped back and away, turning around and heading back up the block. No good.

“End of the week,” he called back over his shoulder, ignoring the way Patrick stood frozen at the foot of the stairs. He took a deep breath when he was far enough away. What the hell was he doing? Jonathan squeezed his eyes shut tight. He just couldn’t seem to help himself. 

*

The weather had turned the sort of cold even Jonathan couldn’t easily shake off when Patrick returned for the final fit. He came in late, well after dark, with the chill air rushing in the door, his cheeks bright and hands tucked deep into his sleeves.

Jonathan never stayed so late at his shop, but Patrick needed the suit for the next day, for the second game in a back-to-back. Something indescribable had apparently occurred roadtripping on the bus to the polyester confabulation he usually wore. He’d been all set to say no, but when Kane had somberly told him that he knew it was a horrible, horrible imposition, over the noise of what could only be the locker room at the other end of the line, Jonathan had found himself sighing and telling him to be by as soon as the game was over. And now, here they were.

Patrick was subdued when he went back to the dressing rooms, eyes downcast.

“Did you lose?” Jonathan asked.

A depressed sigh came from behind the curtain. Ah, so that was a yes then. He’d already hung the suit up on a hook inside, along with a crisp lawn shirt he’d thrown together at the last minute so they wouldn’t have to rely on the blasted Huntsman again.

Jonathan peeled a clementine, waiting for Kane to step out. He was just bringing a section to his mouth when Patrick pushed the curtain back.

“I didn’t know you ate,” Patrick said, staring at him in wonder. Jonathan raised a brow and Patrick blushed. “I just thought that the blood…”

Jonathan leveled a look at him. “My taste buds didn’t go anywhere after the kiss.” He popped another section into his mouth and started looking over the entire ensemble. He stopped, aghast. “Christ above!” 

“What?” Patrick replied, startled, looking down his body.

Jonathan looked at the bunched lines of fabric at his hips. “Are you wearing shorts under there?”

Patrick colored. “These ones are a bit big. I got the wrong size, but they were the only ones clean.”

Jonathan makes a noise of disgust and gestures at the dressing room. “Go back in there and take them off right now. Good lord, that’s terrible.”

Patrick goggled at him. “You want me to freeball it?”

“Yes, I want you to ‘freeball’ it! The suit is designed for your body, not grandfather’s drawers.”

Patrick sheepishly shuffled back into the dressing room and Jonathan rubbed at the bridge of his nose.

When Patrick stepped back out, cheeks bright red, Jonathan pointed to the dressmaker’s podium. Patrick dutifully walked over and climbed up. Despite the blush and the embarrassed cast to his shoulders, the suit looked good on him. Jonathan was a little taken aback at how different the effect was now that the unruly hair had been tamed and Patrick’s full proportions had been realized.

That is, until you looked at his feet and saw his sneakers.

Well, Rome wasn’t built in a day.

He made Patrick shift his weight back and forth and then roll his shoulders. “In future, when you buy a suit, you should be able to do all of that easily. If you can’t, it doesn’t fit.”

Patrick rolled his eyes and nodded.

Jonathan knelt down to check the leg breaks. “You probably have at least another inch in you. When you grow taller, you can come back in and we’ll let out the hems on the trousers.”

“I uh, don’t really recognize myself,” Patrick replied, staring at himself in the mirror. 

Jonathan snorted, fingers skimming along the inseam, checking the stitching out of an insane centuries-old need for absolute perfection and not out of any expectation that he’d actually find anything wrong. When he reached Patrick’s inner thigh, Patrick made a high-pitched noise in the back of his throat.

Jonathan looked up, meeting his eyes. Patrick’s face was flushed red again, but he stared back at Jonathan, gaze unwavering.

“Patrick,” Jonathan said in warning, first name coming to his lips unbidden, but Patrick didn’t look away. Jonathan slowly dragged his fingers up higher, pressing more firmly now, until he stopped at the juncture of Patrick’s thighs, palm meeting the beginning swell of an erection.

He straightened up. Patrick was diminutive enough that even on the podium, Jonathan would barely have to stretch to bring his fangs to his throat. He pressed more firmly with the flat of his hand and Patrick’s eyes dropped shut, chest rising and falling in harsh stuttering gasps.

The wool beneath his palm was hot, stretched out from the shape of Patrick’s cock. When Jonathan circled his palm, Patrick shuddered and bit down at his lip so hard the flesh turned white. The sight of it sent a shock of pleasure so unexpectedly sweet and bright down Jonathan’s spine he was almost taken aback. He didn’t know teasing the kid this way would be so thoroughly enjoyable.

When Patrick opened his blue, blue eyes back up, stared down at him, and asked, “Can I kiss you?” Jonathan meant to say no, Patrick absolutely could not.

Instead he said, “C’mere then,” and lifted his chin so that Patrick could press their lips together. It was a delicate, unsought and unasked for thing, this kiss, but Jonathan found himself letting Patrick coax his lips open, the tip of Patrick’s tongue tracing inside, gingerly careful of the razor tips of his fangs.

The soft, pleased ‘mmm’ sound Patrick made as Jonathan continued to work him through the trousers made him smile against his mouth.

“I’m going to ruin these pants,” Patrick breathed, when they parted.

“You will not,” Jonathan replied firmly, hand dropping away.

Patrick made a noise of protest when Jonathan put some space between them, remembering himself. When Patrick leaned forward, Jonathan stopped him with a palm in the center of his chest.

“I thought…” Patrick trailed off, looking both deeply disappointed and embarrassed at the same time.

Jonathan wanted to kiss that look off his face and then he wanted to hang himself with his measuring tape for ever having the thought, especially over an untried youth with terrible taste in his wardrobe.

“I am too old and have too much sense to debauch you right in the middle of my place of business with the windows open and the lights on.” He hadn’t bothered to comfort somebody since the JFK assassination, and yet somehow here he was, because Jonathan wanted to kiss him again, because he wanted to get Patrick flat in his bed and show him what his body was capable of.

Patrick blinked at him in surprise. So that makes both of them, then.

“I’m not saying no,” Jonathan said gently, “I’m just saying some other time.”

Patrick chewed at his lower lip. “Yeah?”

“I finish what I start, Mr. Kane,” Jonathan told him and then straightened the cuffs on his jacket. “Now go get dressed.”

*

Only he never did get to finish what he started. Things went quite spectacularly sideways on Jonathan in February. Just as the shop got a spate of very demanding customers, the building flooded, ruining thousands of dollars worth of stock and more than a few unfinished projects. Then Molly’s daughter took quite severely ill, ending up in the hospital with nephritis, forcing Molly to take time off to care for her. Joseph got into a car accident, a minor one that only resulted in a broken arm, but it meant that he couldn’t carry out the requisite tasks the shop required until it mended. He was out two workers, people that, insofar as a vampire could be bothered to care, mattered to him, and he was playing double-time catch up to get everybody their orders on time. 

By the time he finally had space to breathe, it’d given him enough time to clear his head. Patrick was currently embroiled in a roadtrip and Jonathan thought that was really for the best. Humans were breakable, fragile things and Patrick, for all his fascination with Jonathan, deserved better. He’d stopped messing about with humans for a reason. And while vampires were currently back en vogue, the reality of taking sustenance from a sexual partner was frequently over-romanticized nonsense. And for him, blood and sex were nearly inseparable. Jonathan would be a real idiot to give into his urges where Patrick was concerned. 

A few days later, Carmilla, who wasn’t quite an enemy and definitely not quite a friend, blew into town. She was somebody he liked to keep on the right side of. Regardless of how jaded he’d become with his business, he’d prefer to set the match to light it on fire himself rather than find it lambasted in the London Times. She was a person of passions, mostly loathing things, and unapologetic snob that she was, she despised Chicago. 

“It was better when it was stockyards on a swamp. Everybody says that Sinclaire made this place sound like a frightful nightmare at the turn of the century, but I always thought there was a certain kind of beauty to it—the death and the shit,” she told him as they walked the lake in the late afternoon sun. “Remind me, had you opened your piddling little shop here yet?”

He was old enough that the sun didn’t pain him, but he was going to have to drink an extra quart of blood tonight to make up for the lost energy, and vicious harridan that she was, she was delighting in it. She had three centuries on him and didn’t feel the sun at all. “Yes, I remember the stockyards,” he said patiently, shielding his eyes against the glare off the water. At least, with the nip of winter in the air, it wasn’t too uncomfortable. 

“Well, I find the whole place quite gauche now. Magnificent Mile, Gold Coast, that ridiculous wheel on Navy Pier…” she replied, shaking her head. Two mothers with strollers gave her a curious glance and Carmilla, catching them at it, smiled, deliberately baring her fangs. Jonathan sighed as the women shrieked and sped up. “Anyway, I don’t know how you stand it. Although I suppose anything is better than that dreary northern wasteland you come from.” 

“I know you’re trying to needle me,” he said. 

“Is it working?” she replied, eyebrow raised. When he didn’t respond, she shook her head. “You know, darling, you’ve gotten really very boring in the last fifty years. I’ve been here two whole hours and you haven’t fought with me once.” 

Jonathan snorted. He’d met Carmilla in Arras, after his engine had failed in the middle of a running dogfight and he’d crash-landed in No Man’s Land at Vimy Ridge. She’d been there with the Gruppe Vimy, disguised as a man and calling herself General Karnstein. He’d only made it out alive because she decided she liked the look of him, something she had been very fond of reminding him in the nearly 100 years they’d known each other. 

They went to dinner that night at Tru after Carmilla demanded it, even though she claimed she’d long since lost her appetite for human food. Nevertheless, she ordered a steak rare and a costly bottle of wine along with her glass of AB-. 

“They don’t let you take it from the vein here?” she asked, when they delivered the blood to her in a decanter. 

“In what universe would they employ somebody just to be bitten by you?" he asked irritably. 

"It's called haute cuisine, you plebe," she replied disdainfully.

Jonathan was in the middle of paying the bill after two hours of being thoroughly poked and prodded at in the most miserable fashion when Patrick walked in with people that Jonathan could only assume were his parents. Jonathan sighed at his misfortune. Patrick was no less compelling now than he was a month ago, especially not when he was wearing Jonathan's suit. The dark navy made his eyes electric and his pale skin flawless. Jonathan tracked his motion closely as Patrick came toward them. He’d done well. He could only hope that Patrick’s inevitable growth wouldn’t come too fast.

“Hi,” Patrick said as he drew even with their table. His eyes flicked curiously over Carmilla, who sat back in her chair, watching him, a speculative gleam in her eye. Jonathan tamped down the urge to kick her underneath the table. 

He leaned back in his chair. “Nice to see you again, Mr. Kane.” All of the urges he’d been suppressing under the weight of the stressful last couple of weeks flooded back. 

“Mom, Dad,” Patrick said, looking over his shoulder at his parents. “This is Jonathan. He tailored my suit.” 

“Oh,” his mother said, brushing an affectionate hand over Patrick’s shoulder. “You did a lovely job. He looks very grown up these days.” 

Jonathan coughed as Patrick protested, trying to shrug his mother off. Who knew that untrammeled guilelessness could be so charming? A few months ago that youthful innocence would’ve repelled him completely. He despaired of himself. Although to say that he wasn’t also caught by the curve of Patrick’s mouth, the soft fringe of his lashes, or the delicate turn of his cheekbones would be an unfettered lie. Jonathan appreciated fine things. He’d made his life in it. He’d known it already, but he’d been very right about the potential of this fine thing. 

“Um, we have to go to dinner,” Patrick said. “It was good to see you.” His cheeks flooded with color as he said it and he shot another quick glance at Carmilla. 

“The pleasure was all mine,” Jonathan replied, inwardly cursing himself for the frisson of pleasure he felt just seeing Patrick. 

Patrick smiled one last time and then moved past them. As he did, Jonathan caught sight of his cufflinks. Garfield the cat cufflinks. On the shirt he’d made. It was a mockery. He only barely refrained from putting his face in his hands. 

“So that’s him, eh?” Carmilla said, getting to her feet with a sinuous vampiric grace. Jonathan helped her into her coat, before donning his own. 

“Him who?” Jonathan said. 

“There’s been talk, darling, of your sudden boringly monkish ways.” Carmilla replied, turning for the door. “I knew there had to be some human that had you all up into a lather. He’s adorable.” 

Jonathan wanted to swear out loud, a tactic a gentleman never resorted to. “Ah, there it is. I’ve made you angry,” she said as they walked out into the night. 

“He’s not to be trifled with, Carmilla,” he replied, eyes hard. 

“Oh, very angry.” She laughed gaily. Jonathan ignored her as they walked towards his car. He dropped her off at her hotel that night without another word spoken between them on the subject. He was quietly hoping it was another twenty years at least before he saw her again. 

*

The next morning he resolved the Garfield cufflinks had to go and that would be the last thing he ever did related to that boy. After this he would consider his work concluded. There were some flashier cufflinks that he knew Patrick would prefer—Deakin & Francis made their money in incredibly expensive kitsch. But if Patrick was going to wear toucans or racecars on his sleeves, he’d really rather he not waste $500 on them. Lanvin had a couple of minimalist pairs he quite liked, but discarded as slightly too plain for Patrick. The Mcqueen was flashy in a slightly effete glam rock direction that also didn’t seem appropriate for his excessive albeit tasteless sensibilities. In the end he chose a Dunhill gyro compass pair with a black PVD finish. The cabochon centers had been designed to look like little galaxies, and that struck him as enough flare for one Patrick Kane. He had one of his assistants wrap them and send them along with a note that said simply:

_I believe you’d be better served by these.  
-J_

That night, barely fifteen minutes after he’d gotten home, just enough time to roll up his sleeves and remove his tie, there was a knock on his door. Wondering who it was, he closed his eyes and listened for the sound of the distinctive heartbeat on the other side of the wall. He recognized it instantly. 

“Mr. Kane, you shouldn’t be here,” he said when he opened his door. Patrick stood in the hall, hands shoved into his pockets, scarf drawn up tight around his chin. 

“You sent me three-hundred dollar cufflinks,” Patrick said, “I looked them up on the internet.” 

Jonathan straightened himself to his full height. “Indeed.” 

“Why?” Patrick asked, staring at him intently. 

“Garfield cufflinks with with a navy mohair?” Jonathan told him. “You didn’t think I’d let an insult like that stand?” 

Patrick narrowed his eyes. “So it was for no other reason than that?” 

Jonathan softened his expression. “Ah, you know that isn’t true.” He couldn’t help himself. He reached out and ran his thumb over the soft swell of Patrick’s lower lip before dropping his hand. “But the fact remains that—” Patrick cut him off mid-sentence by leaning up and planting one on him. He could’ve evaded it, but the truth was, he didn’t want to. He left himself have it for a moment, the fleeting brush of Patrick’s chapped lips across his. 

Patrick pulled away after a moment, a little pink across the cheeks and said, “I thought you finished what you started.” 

Jonathan laughed ruefully. His own words used against him. “There are a million reasons I shouldn’t do this.” 

“I know,” Patrick replied, staring up at him. “Sharpy told me probably half of them.” 

Jonathan turned away from the door, retreating back into his apartment. “Mr. Sharp is right. This isn’t like the movies.” 

“He thinks you have me in thrall…” Patrick told him with a laugh, following as he went to the kitchen to pour himself a glass of wine. 

Jonathan took a long swallow of his nice Viognier and shook his head. “Not my gift.” 

“What is your gift?” 

Jonathan set his glass down on the counter. He didn’t do this often anymore, his two legs were perfectly serviceable. Closing his eyes and concentrating, he let himself blink out and then back into existence right behind Patrick. “This,” he whispered, hot and low, right into his ear, watching Patrick shiver gratifyingly. He allowed himself to linger for a moment, hands hovering just over Patrick’s hips, before winking out again in the span of a breath. 

He reappeared where he started, picking up his wineglass and then blinked again to transport himself to the living room, settling himself down on the couch. He needed those few seconds of distance to remind himself what he was about. Clearly there was going to be some conversation. Jonathan had already accepted that that was out of his control. Patrick was tenacious. A trait he would admire, if it wasn’t testing the limits of his barely threaded together discipline. 

He sighed and tossed back another swallow of wine, waiting for Patrick to join him. It only took him a few moments to figure out where Jonathan was. “That’s incredible!” he breathed, when he saw him. 

“It simply is,” Jonathan replied, carefully tracking Patrick as he came closer. 

Patrick walked over, eyes determined. Jonathan meant to tell him to have a seat on the chair across from him, but Patrick settled himself in Jonathan’s lap before he could protest, knees coming down on either side of his thighs with an easy athletic grace. With their lips separated by only the barest few centimeters, Jonathan said with a sigh, “This really is a very bad idea.” 

Patrick looked down at him. “So stop me,” he said. Jonathan looked up at him, took in his arousal-dark blue eyes and the way he swiped his tongue across his lower lip, and gave himself up for a lost cause. He sank his fingers into Patrick’s hair, pulling his head down to meet his mouth. Just this once, he told himself, as Patrick’s clever tongue urgently sought entrance to his mouth. When Jonathan allowed it, Patrick moaned, rocking his hips forward. Jonathan smiled into his mouth—so eager, Patrick was. Jonathan pressed at the small of his back, urging Patrick on. Patrick gasped out a breath, thighs clenching tight around Jonathan’s, grinding his cock against Jonathan’s belly. His pulse beat hard like a drum in Jonathan’s ear and Jonathan felt a rising tide of desire to bite him, to cup the back of his head and bare his throat for Jonathan to sink his teeth into. He fought it down desperately, hands tightening on Patrick’s hips. Fuck. A million reasons why they shouldn’t do this and here was just one. 

“Shit,” Patrick whispered, head bowing down when Jonathan cupped his ass, dragging him even closer. Jonathan forced himself to focus on the lithe compact body in his arms, rather than the siren-call of blood rushing in the blue tracery of his veins. Patrick shifted so that Jonathan’s cock was riding between his cheeks, the pressure was sweet agony. He wanted to be inside, Patrick’s thighs splayed, as Jonathan helped him bounce up and down on his cock. He wanted that more than he’d wanted anything a long time. But to do that with one so young and inexperienced, Jonathan was deadly sure, was a terrible idea. 

Patrick worked their hips together, and the rasp of it, denim sliding against Jonathan’s superfine wool trousers, was loud in the quiet apartment. There was no escaping who exactly Jonathan was with here, this uncouth, uncultured young man, who nevertheless was moaning so sweetly in his ear, clutching at Jonathan’s shoulders as he pressed their foreheads together. 

“Fuck, if we keep this up I’m gonna cream my jeans,” Patrick muttered, so worked up his breaths were labored. 

“Do it then,” Jonathan told him, skimming his lips across his ear. He chuckled at the strangled sound Patrick made. 

Patrick was shoving his hips against Jonathan’s stomach now, gripping hard at the back of the couch. Jonathan kissed him again, stoppering up his messy moans. Patrick trembled, thigh muscles so tense they quaked. He pushed his hips down one last time and tore his mouth away, gasping out, “Jon.” 

Jonathan drew him back in again, kissing him through his orgasm, cradled close with an arm at the small of his back. 

Finally Patrick’s harsh breaths subsided, and Jonathan allowed his arms to relax. Patrick still had his eyes shut tight. A tremor passed over his face and then finally he opened them to look down at Jonathan, hazy and pleasure-drunk. 

“That wasn’t quite what I was picturing…” he admitted after a moment. “Seemed a little high school.” 

Jonathan let out a breath and shook his head. The moment was over now. Jonathan still had an erection, but it would subside.

“Go and get yourself cleaned up,” he said as Patrick slowly climbed back to his feet. Patrick cracked his back, stretching his arms above his head, before turning around. “There’s a guest bath down the…” he trailed off as Patrick started stripping off his clothes heading very obviously not for the guest bathroom but for Jonathan’s own bedroom. 

“Mr. Kane,” he called out, using the same voice he would if he was subduing an obdurate, unruly customer, but Patrick merely ignored him, disappearing down the hall. 

“Fuck,” he said, thunking his head back down on the sofa. He gave himself a moment before blinking himself into the bedroom. He hadn’t bothered to use this trick so much in years. With Patrick it was rapidly proving useful. He rematerialized to find Patrick sprawled out naked on his bed, teeth worrying his lower lip. 

“Wow, this is nice,” Patrick said, arching like a cat, rubbing his bare skin against Jonathan’s expensive duvet. Patrick looked over at him. “You’re still dressed.” 

Jonathan sighed and sat down at the edge of the bed. “What do you think is going to happen here?” 

Patrick twisted onto his side, a smirk on his lips. This kid was far too confident for his own good. “You haven’t gotten off yet,” he said, reaching out to run his hand up Jonathan’s thigh. 

“You’re incorrigible,” Jonathan told him. Patrick grinned, propping himself up on one elbow to kiss Jonathan. His hand inched higher on Jonathan’s thigh as he did it, as if somehow he could distract Jonathan from noticing those creeping fingers with the wet swipe of his tongue. Jonathan caught at his hand and carefully broke the kiss. 

Patrick shivered, eyes still closed. “I want you to fuck me,” he whispered, spread-fingered palm tightening on Jonathan’s thigh underneath Jonathan’s hand. 

“Have you ever done that before?” Jonathan asked back, hovering over Patrick’s mouth. 

Patrick bit at his lip. “No.” 

“Bad idea,” Jonathan told him, starting to straighten up. 

Patrick made a plaintive noise. “God, let me—let me do something.” 

Jonathan smiled at him. “You don’t need to do anything.” 

Patrick reached up, tracing over Jonathan’s cheekbone with light fingers. “I want to though. Let me suck you off,” Patrick asked. “And before you say no, I _have_ done it before!”

Jonathan rumbled out a laugh, brushing his lips over Patrick’s forehead. “With some other burgeoning adolescent back in juniors, I imagine.” 

Patrick made a face. “Well yeah, but over Christmas, when I was home for for a few days, I found a vampire at bar. Tall, broad, hung—I went to my knees for him in the bathroom, and the entire time he was choking me on his dick I imagined it was you.” 

Jonathan’s heart nearly stopped in his chest. He searched Patrick’s clear eyes for the lie, thumb over the steady pulse beating in his throat. As far as he could tell it was the truth. “That was foolish, Patrick,” he said, voice dropping an octave. “Very foolish.”

“I’m good at it, let me show you,” Patrick told him, ignoring the dangerous note in his voice. A mischievous look had come into his eyes, completely unafraid of Jonathan’s sudden change in mood. When he reached for Jonathan’s trousers, Jonathan caught at his hands. “Please?” Patrick asked. “You won’t hurt me.” 

Jonathan breathed out through his nose and finally let go, allowing Patrick to pull his cock free of his trousers. It was flushed, hard and full, shiny already at the tip, and Patrick licked his lips like a little minx when he saw it. It took a supreme effort to keep still when Patrick gave him an experimental stroke before leaning forward over Jonathan’s thighs and taking him deep into his hot mouth. Patrick moaned around him and Jonathan froze, tense and still, watching Patrick take him in. The sudden wet heat engulfing him threatened to undo his composure. 

With Patrick twisted like this on the bed, cheek propped on Jonathan’s thigh as he slurped at him, the strong muscles of his throat were visible, blood pulsing just beneath the surface of the thin skin. Jonathan squeezed his eyes shut tight and turned his head away, fighting not to shake from the effort of holding himself back. Unawares, Patrick licked and sucked at him like he was candy, hand fisted at the base. Sometimes he swirled his tongue over and over the crown and sometimes he slid forward until the head of Jonathan’s cock was bumping at the soft cavern of his throat. 

Patrick grew increasingly flushed, eyes wet at the corners, turning his eyelashes dark on his cheeks. God he was beautiful. Jonathan threaded his fingers through the hair curling at his nape and stared in wonder as Patrick took him deep again, swollen lips spread taut around him. Patrick moaned, eyelids fluttering as Jonathan stroked his fingers through Patrick’s hair. 

It had been too long for Jonathan and he was going to finish in embarrassingly short order. A few more hard sucks and he was thumbing at Patrick’s cheek. “Pull off, love, I’m about to finish.” 

Patrick opened his eyes, blinking hazily, he slowly drew his mouth off, a thread of spit trailing from the corner of his mouth to the rosie head of Jonathan’s cock. He replaced his mouth with his hand and shifted back so that his head was propped on Jonathan’s knee, fist working his spit back into Jonathan’s skin as he stared up at him. 

Jonathan came on a soft exhale, with those blue eyes on him, the thick viscous fluid of his come coating Patrick’s hand. Jonathan ran his tongue over his teeth, breathing deep, and then pulled his handkerchief out of his breast pocket so that Patrick could wipe off his hand. That taken care of, he carefully shifted out from under Patrick’s head. Patrick let out a groan, flopping onto his back as Jonathan stood up, going to his dresser to clean himself up. Jonathan caught sight of him in the mirror, arm across his face, knee lifted, cock hard and angry red once again, jutting up on his belly. 

“Okay?” Jonathan asked. 

Patrick sighed. His voice was raw and used when he asked, “Were you into it? You look like you just took a walk in the park.” 

Jonathan turned around as he removed his vest, setting it carefully atop the dresser. Patrick eyed him, face open and vulnerable. Jonathan smiled and walked back over, bending down to catch Patrick up in another kiss. He tasted like Jonathan when he kissed him, the salt sweat of his skin on his tongue. This pleased him. He allowed himself to nibble Patrick’s lower lip before straightening up again to unbutton his shirt. “I’m going to take a shower. You’re welcome to join me,” he said, before getting up and heading to the bathroom. 

He’d just got the water temperature right for a human body when Patrick padded in after him. He stopped when he realized Jonathan was naked, testing out the water at the lip of the tub before he climbed in. Jonathan turned to look, watching Patrick take a moment to stare at him. 

“You uh...you,” Patrick said dumbly, staring at his chest and stomach muscles. 

“Coming in?” Jonathan asked as he stepped under the spray. The water was much warmer than he liked, but if they stuck to his preferred setting, it would be uncomfortably cold for Patrick. Patrick followed him in after a moment’s hesitation. He kept watching as Jonathan scrubbed himself down and then dipped under the spray to wash off. His blond curls got damp from the steam, clinging to his forehead. Jonathan was struck by the urge to brush them off his face. 

“How are you so tan?” Patrick asked, eyes running up and down his body. 

“Just part of my biology,” Jonathan replied. 

Patrick rolled his eyes. “Vampires all have perfect tans? I don’t think so. I know you think I’m all inexperienced or whatever, but I think we just established that you’re not the first vampire I’ve been with.” 

“Oh yes, do remind me of that,” Jonathan told him, narrowing his eyes. 

Patrick poked him, tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth. “C’mon, tell me!” 

“Because I was this way when I was given the kiss,” Jonathan said with a laugh. 

“You’ve had a tan for two centuries?” Patrick teased. 

Jonathan rolled his eyes. “You’re familiar with telomeres? The ends of nucleotides that when shortened affect aging?” 

“Yeeeees?” Patrick said, although he clearly had no clue. 

“In the normal human DNA replicates, yes?” he said as he shampooed up his hair. Patrick nodded. “Over time, during the natural progression of this, telomeres shorten, which causes aging. But you have a compensatory mechanism in place called telomerase, which through a process known as reverse transcription, rebuilds shortened genetic material.”

“Okay?” Patrick said. 

“In vampires, what we commonly refer to as the kiss is now understood to be a retrovirus, which similarly replicates in its host via reverse transcription. Essentially each vampire has a hyperactive viral version of telomerase, which works to preserve and regenerate the body as it was upon infection,” Jonathan explained, briefly ducking back to wash the shampoo out of his hair. “I was given the kiss in the summer, so though I don’t indulge over much in sun exposure, the retrovirus works to preserve the melanin in my skin based on the unique DNA template I had when I was bitten.” 

Patrick traced a palm over Jonathan’s wet skin, lingering over his nipple. “Is that why vampires don’t like sun? Because it uh...inhibits this process or whatever?” 

“Very good,” Jonathan replied with a smile. “As we get older, we become less susceptible to what's known as heliosis. I’m young enough yet that UV radiation still bothers me if I’m exposed for long enough.” 

“I’ve never thought of you as young before,” Patrick said with a laugh. 

“C’mere,” Jonathan told him, pouring shampoo into his palm and making Patrick turn around so he could lather up his hair. Patrick gave a pleased rumble as Jonathan worked his fingers over Patrick’s scalp. “Rinse,” he told him when he was finished. 

Patrick obligingly washed the suds out of his hair, back turned to Jonathan. “But there are other effects to the...the retrovirus? Like the teleporting and the…”

“Bloodlust,” Jonathan finished for him. Patrick looked over his shoulder at him with big eyes and Jonathan sighed, moving in close. “And that’s why I can’t fuck you. I want, very desperately, every time I’m with you to bite you.” He rested his chin on Patrick’s shoulder, laying a soft kiss on the wing of it. “If we did that, I don’t think I’d be able to stop myself.”

“What if I want you to bite me?” Patrick asked, throat moving as he swallowed. 

“Patrick,” Jonathan admonished. 

“You don’t understand—I want to be with you,” Patrick told him. 

“It’ll hurt,” Jonathan told him. 

“Is it dangerous?” Patrick asked. “Sharpy said you’d be old enough to know...you’d know how to stop.” 

“I know how to stop,” Jonathan said. What team was Sharp on here? First he’d been accusing Jonathan of messing about in Patrick’s head and putting him in thrall and then he was telling him he’d able to control himself if he went for the throat? Jonathan wanted to send him a strongly worded letter to make up his fucking mind. He blew out a breath. “But, this is still no small thing you’re committing yourself to.” 

“Do it,” Patrick told him, voice sure. “I want you to.” 

“I—” Jonathan stopped himself, torn. He wanted to desperately, but he was afraid also. He’d been with more than one human who’d been repulsed by the act in his years, who’d found it frightening. It wasn't like the movies where vampire prey were so overcome with lust that it overrode the ache of being bitten. He didn’t want Patrick to feel that way. 

“I’m not scared of you,” Patrick said firmly, turning his head. “So do it.” 

Jonathan wavered for a moment longer. It had been a long time since somebody had offered this to him, since he’d allowed anybody to get close enough to do such a thing. He took a deep breath and then pushed in closer, drawing Patrick back into his body. He drew his hand up Patrick’s chest to wrap around his throat, spread-fingered, forcing Patrick to tilt his head back onto Jonathan’s shoulder. He shivered in Jonathan’s grasp, and when he looked down Patrick’s body, he saw that he was still hard, dick flushed and ready. 

“Do it,” Patrick moaned and Jonathan finally allowed himself to give in. He wrapped his other hand around Patrick’s cock, giving it a soft tug in the same moment he pierced his skin with his fangs. Patrick jerked and shuddered in his arms, hips pushing up into his fist, as the bright red taste of iron exploded in his mouth. The first time he’d drunk from the vein in years and years. He tasted wonderful—beautiful, healthy O- sliding down his throat. Jonathan preferred blood with no Rh factor. It was a cruel trick of the universe that Patrick was Rh negative. Jonathan didn’t know how he was ever going to be able to let him go now. 

“Oh god,” Patrick exhaled as Jonathan stroked him off, each suck from his mouth carefully timed with the gentle throb of his heart. Patrick clung to him, tense in his arms. Jonathan could feel his throat moving under the cage of his fingers. He groaned and twisted as Jonathan drew his hand up over the head of Patrick’s cock, thumb pressing tight up under the corona, making Patrick curse. Jonathan took one last sip, tongue swiping over the wound he’d left behind to gather every last drop, and Patrick came explosively in his hand. 

“Ungh,” he said, sagging back in Jonathan’s arms. Jonathan held him close for a long moment, letting Patrick’s breathing adjust. 

“You okay?” Jonathan asked him, drawing his nose along the line of Patrick’s neck. 

“Fuck,” Patrick whispered, voice raw. “That was hot.” 

“You’re something else,” Jonathan said with a warm laugh. 

“I know,” Patrick breathed. Jonathan heard the smile in his voice. He made sure that Patrick was standing on his own two feet and then carefully shut the tap off. 

“C’mon,” he said, stepping out the shower. He dried himself off and then wrapped a towel around his waist, rummaging around to find a first aid kit while Patrick was towelling his hair.

“Huh,” Patrick said, watching as Jonathan poured rubbing alcohol onto a cotton swab.

“Unsexy, I know,” Jonathan told him. “My mouth is sterile, but that doesn’t mean my apartment is.” 

He walked up behind Patrick and swiped the puncture marks on his neck carefully. Patrick didn’t flinch from the sting of the alcohol, but he did hiss when taped a cotton pad over the bite. 

“Does it hurt?” Jonathan asked concerned, meeting Patrick’s eyes in the bathroom mirror. 

Patrick colored a little. “No, it’s uh...I’m into it.” 

Jonathan dropped his forehead to Patrick’s shoulder with a groan. “You, my dear, have no sense of self-preservation.” 

“So, does this mean you’ll fuck me now?” Patrick asked, leaning back against him. He looked eager in the mirror. 

“What did I just say?” Jonathan asked him with an incredulous laugh. He swatted him on the ass. “Not tonight, you little slut.” 

He abandoned Patrick in the bathroom to finish drying off. He went to locate some clothing for Patrick to sleep in. Patrick hadn't made it clear if he had any intention of leaving tonight, but Jonathan had absolutely zero intention of letting him. 

“How about tomorrow then?” Patrick called after him.

“Hmm,” he said, mock consideringly. “I’ll think about it.” 

*

**_Epilogue…_ **

“Quit fidgeting,” Jonathan said, kneeling at Patrick’s feet at the podium. He tugged gently on Patrick’s pant leg and gave him a significant look. Patrick grinned and didn’t listen, so Jonathan got to his feet, swatting his ass. “Do you want this to be finished in time for you to wear it?” 

“Who even knows if I’ll win the Calder anyway,” Patrick replied, shifting his feet as Jonathan walked around him to check the seaming in the shoulders on the tropical wool suit. He’d chosen a pale grey, this time, for the summer. 

“Liar,” Jonathan replied, pinching him in the side. He met Patrick’s eyes in the tryptich mirror. “You’re counting on it.” 

“Well, I am awesome,” Patrick replied, cheeky grin firmly in place. Jonathan moved around to the front to check the drape. Patrick leaned forward while Jonathan was in the middle of checking the ticket pocket and tilted Jonathan’s chin up so he could press a kiss on him. “Hi,” he said, when he pulled away. 

“Please abstain from interfering with your tailor, Mr. Kane,” Jonathan told him with a glare. 

“You told everybody to take the evening off,” Patrick told him. “Who’s gonna stop me.” 

Jonathan made a clucking noise in the back of his throat, dropping his hands from Patrick’s body. “That will be all for today, go get dressed,” he said, shooting a significant look at the dressing room. While Patrick was changing, Jonathan headed for the back of the shop. He still had some work for other clients to finish up as well as a few things to take care of for Patrick. They’d gotten him a pair of Church’s leather oxfords in Oxblood to go with the navy suit, but he’d asked for Steven Lowe to come by and have him fit for a pair of John Lobb brogues to go with this suit for the NHL awards. Patrick’s schedule was, as usual, proving difficult though, even with the season over, and he’d already had to reschedule twice. 

He called Mr. Lowe up while Patrick was busy and arranged to swing by his hotel with Patrick tomorrow morning. The only time Mr. Lowe was available was of course unconscionably early, but needs must. Patrick, he’d found out, had a surprising yen for shoes. Gaudy sneakers mostly, but he’d showed an interest in the dress shoes Jonathan kept providing for him too. Jonathan’d made significant inroads on shaping up Patrick’s wardrobe over the course of the season. Enough that Patrick was claiming he had far too many clothes, to which Jonathan gaily replied he was happy to burn several choice outfits to clear up space. 

“So there’s nobody else in the shop,” Patrick said, coming up behind him, wrapping his arms around Jonathan’s waist. 

Jonathan let Patrick lean his cheek against his back for a moment, before turning in his in arms. "So?" he said. 

Patrick raised himself on tiptoes to brush their mouths together again, making a pleased noise when Jonathan kissed back. He brought his hand up to Patrick’s throat, fingertips tracing over the spot he’d bitten him just last night, his cock buried deep inside Patrick, fucking him until he begged to come. He pressed down over the wound deliberately, making Patrick moan into his mouth, hips surging up against Jonathan’s. Ah, perfect. Jonathan brushed their lips together delicately once more and then pulled away, hands framing Patrick’s face. 

“No,” he said firmly, laying a kiss on the tip of Patrick’s nose. 

“Lamer,” Patrick said, cheeks gone delightly pink and eyes bright. Teenagers, Jonathan chuckled. He nipped at Patrick’s luscious lower lip because he couldn’t not, but then he put some space between them, stepping past Patrick to pick up his suit jacket and pull it on. 

“Someday you’ll break,” Patrick said, voice sing-song. 

“Mmm, I’m sure you’re right. Someday I’ll surely lose my mind and despoil you in front of all my customers,” Jonathan replied. “Now where are you taking me for dinner?”

“I was thinking we might go to uh...Avec,” Patrick said. “Marty recommended it to me.” 

“Hmm, have you developed a sudden taste for wine?” Jonathan asked. Patrick made a face that Jonathan caught before he could hide it. He chuckled. “How about I let you buy me a burger and a beer.” 

“I didn’t think that was elegant enough for you,” Patrick teased, shoving his hands into his pockets. 

“I think I can live with some peasant food for one night,” he said. Patrick snorted derisively and Jonathan grinned back. His face was doing that rather a lot these days. How very, very strange. 

*

**Author's Note:**

> NOW ON TO THE NEXT WIP. Come find me on [tumblr.](http://the4freedoms.tumblr.com/)


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